Experienced and Student EFL Teachers' Instructional Thoughts and Actions

Abstract

This study examines if experienced and student EFL teachers differ from each other in terms of: (a) their use of student performance cues, (b) their instructional actions in response to student performance cues, (c) their instructional goals and instruction-related knowledge they recalled applying during the process of EFL instruction. Transcriptions of videotaped lessons of five experienced and five student EFL teachers and explanations of their instructional goals and instruction-related knowledge were analyzed. The results indicated that there were patterns of similarities and differences between experienced and student teachers' instructional actions and thoughts. The results concerning the differences between experienced and student teachers confirmed the findings of previous studies conducted in instructional contexts with native speakers of English. Moreover, a comparison of the findings of this study with those of a previous study on the instructional thoughts and decisions of ESL student teachers indicated that there may be patterns of goals and instructional actions that are unique to ESL/EFL instructional contexts.